Session 502WWDC 2016

Become a News Publisher. Apple News allows you to monetize your stories and find new readers. Learn how to sign up and discover how easy it is to integrate with your existing CMS or author stories using the News Publisher authoring tool.

[ Music ]

Alright.

Good afternoon, everyone.

[ Applause ]

Welcome, and thank you for coming to this session.

My name is Ryan Griggs, and I work on the Apple News team,and I am thrilled to be here this afternoon to talk to youabout some of the great things you can do in Apple News,how to get set up, and some best practices.

So we have a lot to cover today, and so I wanted to gothrough a quick agenda so we know where we arein the presentation as we, as we go through it.

So first we'll do a quick intro to News to get an understandingof sort of why News exists, and what it's all about.

We'll also take a quick look at the app to get some contextas far as where your, your contentand your publication will show up.

And then next we'll learn how to setup your channel using News Publisher, which is the toolthat we use to manage content in Apple News.

Then we'll do a quick overview of RSS,and then we'll dive a bit deeper on Apple News Format.

Then we'll also talk about howto publish articles in Apple News.

We have a few different options and make it really easyto author and then deliver content into our system.

We'll talk about how to make money off your content.

Talk about analytics and insights.

Specifically, what's available to youas an Apple News Format Publisher, and then talkabout a few best practicesfor making your publication successful in Apple News.

So, first, let's do a quick intro to the Apple News app.

So News was launched with iOS9 last year with the goalof delivering the best stories from the best publishers,and then personalizing it for you.

And so News is built right into iOS, which means it's availableto anyone with an iOS device as long as they live in oneof the three countries News is available in, and so News isin the U.S., U.K. and Australia right now.

And so one of the big parts of News is Apple News Format,which is our JSON based document format.

It makes it possible to create some amazing very engagingexperiences within your articles.

And so we'll talk a bit more about that later.

But in order to understand how cool Apple News Format is,I wanted to show you a few articles that are good examplesof what you can do with it.

So this one is an article from "Wired,"and we'll actually scroll through thisand take a look at what's in there.

You can see there's a little bit of parallax as we scroll.

There's beautiful imagery.

This is a photo mosaic.

Can tap in on the photos, swipe through them.

It's really great, immersive, and beautiful.

And you'll also notice, too, that as we scroll, this is,of course, a, a "Wired" article.

This looks like "Wired".

And so we give you the tools to make your articlesand your channel look like your brand.

So here's another one from "Bloomberg."

Very different look to this, but, again, very strikingwith some beautiful photography.

You see we have some of type on top of the images.

As you scroll, some really beautiful bold topography.

Great use of parallax here.

It really shows a lot of emotion and depth in this article.

So another great example.

Show you one more.

This one in iPad.

You can really do a lot of cool stuff with Apple News,and this is an example of a publisher of the BBC who,who really created something at the beginning of the articlethat makes you want to read furtherand see what other great stuff you might find.

So Apple News Format gives you a lot of really cool tools.

So let's take a quick look at the News app.

Just understand where your content shows up.

So News is organized into five separate tabs.

So first we have For You.

For You is a personalized feed of articles that deliver contentthat you're interested in based upon what you're followingand what you're reading.

And it's got a huge update, as you saw yesterday.

We have a completely new redesign and all new lookand feel but also the concept of sections, which include thingslike trending, topic groups based upon what you're followingin News, and then featured stories which allow our editorsto find some of the most beautiful,engaging Apple News format articlesand feature them right in for you.

Favorites.

This is where your publication goeswhen a user taps the Plus (+) button to favorite it,and it allows you just to return to your publication at any time.

And then we have Explorer.

This is where users will go to find new channelsand then new topics, and so we have topics and news in additionto publications, and these are essentially combinationsof articles from different publishers allaround a specific topic.

So you can follow things like sportsor heavy metal or whatever you like.

Then, of course, we have Search.

We have hundreds of thousands of topics in News,and you can search for topicsand publications in the News app.

And then, finally, your articles can end up in Saved.

If a user starts reading them but feels like they wantto finish reading it later, and you can also lookat your history and clear it if you like as well.

So that's how News is organized within the app.

So during this session, we're going to talk about someof the best practices when publishing news and howto get set up, but, first, let's discuss your publicationand how it shows up in News.

So publications in News are called channels.

So what is a channel?

Well, this is what a channel looks like,and this is the one we're going to createin News today in this presentation.

So channels represent your publication in News are sortof like your home page.

Articles you publish appear in your channel,and it's where users can return to to engage more deeplyand directly specifically with your brand.

So a good example for, of a channel would be, like,a magazines, a newspaper, or a blog.

They're very customizable.

So you can really make them reflect the look of your brand.

So you can do things like customize the logo,add a cover image, which we'll talk about a bit laterand customize sections to organize your content.

And you can create more than one channel.

So if you have more than one blog or more than one newspaper,you can have a separate channel for each one.

They can be based on Apple News format or RSS, and you can linkto them just using a regular link.

So how do we set up a channel in News Publisher,or to set up a channel in Apple News?

It lets you do things like set up and configure optionsfor your channels to make sure it looks likeand works like you want it to.

It lets you assign roles to people in your organization.

It lets you view analytics, set up reports, and gain insighton how your articles and your channel is performing.

It also helps you set up delivery of contentand helps you manage it.

It even lets you create Apple News format articles rightfrom News Publisher, and we'll do a demo of that shortly.

So a few things to thinkabout before you sign up for Apple News.

You want to consider who will,who's going to manage the account.

Think about people like interns.

They eventually leave, and you don't want to leave accessto your account to an internthat won't be here in a few months.

So make sure you give access to someonewho will be with you for a while.

So a common problem that we have.

You also want to use a real e-mail address that you own.

Sounds like an obvious thing, but we actually communicatewith you via this e-mail address if we find issues with,for example, your RSS feed or what we're findingin your Apple News format articles.

And so we want to be able to use that to get a hold of you.

And also think about international distribution.

So News is available in the U.S., U.K., and Australia.

You want to make sure that you've got rightsto deliver whatever content, images,etc. in Apple News in these territories.

And so the easiest way to sign up to publish in Apple News isto go to our developer page or just go to Apple.com/news scrollto the bottom, and then click on Sign-Up Now.

That will take you directly to News Publisher.

So News Publisher requires an Apple ID.

If you don't have one already, then you'll be promptedto set one up, although I suspect most people herehave one.

And then once you've signed up to publish in Apple News,the News Publisher icon will show up in iCloud nextto your other icons so you can get back to it really quickly.

It's one of the great things about using Apple ID isthat when you use the same oneas on your iOS device it allows youto easily preview articles before you publish righton your device.

So this is what News Publisher looks like.

We're not going to dive into it just yet, but we're goingto start up by talking about a few of the things you needwhen you're setting up your channel.

So every channel, no matter if it's using RSSor Apple News format, needs a few things.

One, it needs sections; two, it needs a channel logo;and it needs a cover image.

And so let's talk about the best practices for a few of these.

So, first, sections.

So sections make it possible to group your articles by type.

So, like, entertainment, top stories, or sports.

You can have a lot of sections in News,but we really recommend only having three to fourbecause essentially we don't see people scrollingto find more channels that are off screen, and you want themto fit on an iPhone screen at rest.

And for the same reason as using only as many sectionsas you need, keep the name short.

You don't want to have really long namesthat push your other sections off the screen.

It's important to note that the first section is alwaysthe default.

So when users come to your channel or return to it,this is what they will see first.

It's sort of like the first impressionthat they'll, that they will see.

Another really important note is when Apple News goesand builds the For You feed, it's going to look at articlesthat are in your default first section in your channel and pullfrom there and not your other sections.

So if you want to have your articles potentially show up inFor You, for, in user's Apple News app, you need to make surethat you're publishing them to the default section.

So for the channel logo,the channel logo is essentially an imageof your publication's logo.

And so for maximum legibility, you want your logoto be horizontal text on one line,use transparent background with no fill.

If you don't use a transparent background, you're going to endup with a logo that looks something like this.

Something that we see fairly often, and we, we need to,to reach out to publishers to fix.

Also avoid using just raw photos.

They're going to end up being really smallin the various places that we use them in News,and sometimes we end up just being a, a grey box as wellbecause they don't have transparency.

We recommend having a logo that's 256 pixels tall,and then not more than 10 to 1 aspect ratio,but don't make it any wider than you need to.

Otherwise, it will make it incredibly smallin some places like 4U Feeds.

In many places, the logos are very small on the screen,and they just get lost in the [inaudible].

And then, finally, with promotional text or URL's,you typically want to avoid using those if you can.

The promotional text will be very hard to read in places,and just makes your logo smaller.

And then URL's set up the expectationthat they will be tappable, which, of course, they won't be.

And so this is what a channel logo looks like in the 4U Feed.

And so this is a really important placefor your channel logo to look great because the vast majorityof our users spend time in 4U, and so you want to make surethat your logo looks great and is highly legible here.

So your logo also appears in your channel tile,and so the channel tile is a combination of the channel logoand what we call a cover image.

And a channel tile is essentially your billboardwithin News to bring readers in, and this is what it lookslike in favorites, but it's also featured in several other placesin News, including our on-boarding experience.

This is where users first enter News and make decisionsabout who they're going to follow in the Apple News app.

And so this is going to be your only representation,especially for those users who don't know anythingabout your publication.

You want to make sure that you have a great logoand a great cover image that's representativeof what your brand is all about and is super engaging.

We also have channel tiles in Explorerwhere editors can feature them, and we have recommendations comein the For You feed occasionally.

So it's a really important way to drive users to sign up for,to follow your channel and to read it.

So to make the cover image look as great as possible, please,please submit a high-quality, high-resolution images.

We recommend 600 x 600 pixels.

You can choose two paths for this.

You can either do a static cover,which means that it will always be the same.

This is great for brandsthat have a really identifiable logo mark, or an,an image that users will recognize when they see it,but you can also choose to have a dynamic cover image as well.

This is great if you want users returning to your channel,and they see your tile, and it actually pulls imagefrom articles in your feed, and so it stays very up to dateand dynamic with what's happening in your channel.

So when you're signing up to publish in Apple News,you'll eventually see this screenwhere you can choose whether to sign up for Apple News formator whether to use RSS.

So we're going to talk about each of these.

Let's briefly talk about RSS.

So when does it make sense to use RSS?

So News supports displaying articles from your RSS feedif you have one, and it's an appropriate solutionif you already have a website or you already have an RSS feed,and you want to get your content into News really quickly.

But, ultimately, we only really recommend using RSSas a stepping stone to get to Apple News format.

It's important to note that the vast majority of articles readin Apple News are using Apple News format,and so they're really engaging.

They have animations and parallax and all of the thingsthat Apple News format allows.

And so if you're not using Apple News format, it's a,it's not a great comparison.

So we, it's always best to use Apple News format.

But if you do need to use Apple News format, or if you do needto use RSS, these are someof the features that, that RSS supports.

Gives you the ability to, to pull in images,headlines, and excerpts.

We also show a preview page of RSS articlesthat it pulls from your feed.

And so this allows those to, those previewsto load really quickly so we don't haveto load from your web page.

We host the RSS excerpt.

So when you use a [inaudible] article, it loads immediately.

And then, of course,you ultimately will host your web page if users choose to tapthrough to your web page.

So there's some best practices for RSS.

You want to make your preview full and enticing.

If you make it really short, the odds are users will tap in,see that it's only a sentence or two, and then go back outand look for one of the many Apple News format articlesthat offer a full experience.

So use long form, full text RSS when you can,and avoid links to unrelated content.

You don't really need that in your preview,and it just clutters up the experience and takes awayfrom the simplicity and the beauty of your article.

And then Apple News already has builtinto some great sharing features that users are accustomedto using to share your content is you don't needto include links like tweet this or like this on Facebook.

If you have that set in iOS for improved legibility,and then we're also very accessible.

We have great support for the accessibility featuresin iOS like voice over.

And we have lots of options for deliveryof content into Apple News.

So lots of advantages to using Apple News format.

And so we clicked our blue button in RSS,and we've been approved to use Apple News format.

And so we've got our channel ready, but now we needto deliver an article into Apple News so we can take a look at itand make sure that it's formatted correctly and,and is working as it should,and so you can do that a couple ways.

You can do that by creating an article using the built-inauthoring tool, or you can deliver an article via the API.

And so we'll talk about both of those in more detail later,but let's say that you've delivered your article.

We'll take a moment to look at it, and then we'll gothrough a pending state.

And then once you're ready to go,you'll see at the top available in News status,and that means your channel is live, ready to go.

And, of course, you can reorder them,rename them here as you like as well.

We also have the ability to manage membersand roles within Apple News.

So if you work in a multi-person team, it's really easyto invite new users, assign roles from admin,which has full access to everythingin News Publisher all the way down to sales peoplewho only access analytics and view articles or just viewerswho can only view the content in it.

So very powerful.

So a few best practices when you're using Apple News format.

First, you want to make sure you're using appropriatesubject matter.

You want to avoid things like click baitor misleading headlines.

It's really not what we look for in News.

News is also not allowed to be created,to be used as a marketing platform.

So use things like the animation and the beautiful galleriesand imagery that really draws users inand makes them come back and makes them read longer.

And use analytics to your advantage.

Pay attention to what users are reading,and maybe they're reading a lot of one type of articleor a specific article that you've, that you wrote,and they may want to, you may wantto write more articles like that.

Then, of course, you want to monetize,which we'll talk about in a minute.

So three ways to get your content into Apple News.

One is web authoring, another is Apple News API,and the third is plug-ins.

So if you want to know more about this,if you have specific questions or are having issues getting setup with the Apple News API, please attend the labsthat we have a lab today, and we also have one on Friday as well.

We'll have Apple News engineers on handto answer any questions you might have.

Alright. Third, let's talk about plug-ins,the third way you can get content into Apple News.

So WordPress is one of the plug-ins we offer.

We actually offer several of them,and the published Apple News plug in is a really easy wayto publish articles directly into News from WordPress.

It's also one of the most popular integrations wehave today.

And so this is what it looks like in WordPress.

As a, WordPress is a nice simple authoring interface,and there's an Apple News section off to the right sidethat gives you many features you need to publishin Apple News including choosing which section,adding a pull quote, and, and other features.

So it's really simple and very integrated.

We also support publishing directly from Drupal,which is a content management software systemthat many websites that you use every day are powered by.

And so you can publish directly from Drupal and Apple News.

And today we also announced that Craft cms is also integratingwith Apple News, and you can publish directlyfrom their system.

It's very exciting.

And then next, I'm really thrilled to announcein this session that we have a brand-new Apple News integrationwith Squarespace.

And so Squarespace, as you guys know,helps anyone build beautiful websites online.

The Apple News integration lets Squarespace customers reallyseamlessly publish into Apple News and share their brandwith the world, and, of course, because of Squarespace,it's really beautiful and easy to use.

So, it's a really exciting integration.

We're thrilled to, to have them on board.

So integrations of these four platforms make it really easyto publish into Apple News using the tools you already use everyday instantly.

So I really urge you to go check themout if you use any of these.

So next let's talk about making money off your articlesand channels in News.

So News makes it really easy to generate revenue using ads.

Now as a publisher, you're able to sell adsin a few key places in your channel,in articles, and between articles.

And so one of the great things about monetizingin Apple News are the business terms.

So if you sell your own ads,you get to keep 100 percent of the revenue.

And for the inventory that you didn't sell,you can have Apple backfill, and keep 70 percent of the revenue.

So it's a, a really great, a great way to make money.

One note, though, is that ads in Apple News are only availablefor articles delivered by API at this time.

So a quick look at some of the ad formatsthat are available in News today.

So we've got standard, we've got double, we have large ad format,mrects in articles, interstitial.

This is when you're swipingbetween articles in your channel.

We also have sponsored native ads.

And then video ads, if you have video content,and this is what they look like on iPad.

So they're really simple, and they really enhance the content.

So a few things to thinkabout when you're monetizing and using ads.

Avoid some common mistakes.

Keeping, keeping an eye on the settingsthat you have for your ads.

If, for example, you've booked a campaign for, for double ads,and you have mrects in your articles.

Those, obviously, aren't going to deliver, and so you wantto make sure that you're not making any little mistakeslike that.

You also should enable backfill where you're not planningon selling ads, but you should really sell your own adsif you can.

That's the best way to make money in News today.

Also, we also give you the abilityto exclude certain categories of ads in your channel,but if you exclude too many, you're going to endup with too low of an ad supply, and so only excludewhere you need to so you don't cut yourself out of revenue.

You can also experiment with larger ad formats.

We found out the larger ad formats have much higherclick-through rates.

So think about things like the interstitial ads.

And then consider video free role if you're findingthat users are engaging with your video content.

And so we have a tool that's made for managing your adswhich is called Workbench.

And so you can do a couple main things with this.

First, you can monitor the News revenuefor the campaigns you already have set up.

It's really easy to keep an eye on things there,and you can also set up campaigns.

You can book, manage, reporton individual campaigns right from Workbench.

It's a really simple and intuitive tool.

Next, analytics and insight.

So we offer powerful analytics tools in News.

Once you've started delivering articles,you can get some great insighton how your content is performing,which articles are doing better than others,how your traffic looks like over time.

It's a really great exclusive toolfor Apple News Format Publishers.

We offer a dashboard that gives you great at-a-glance insighton the content performance, and if you're a power user,you can download the raw data via CSV,but Apple News Format only.

This is what the analytics dashboard looks like.

This is a view of channel data,and so you can see these are how many unique viewers thisparticular channel has over the course of a few days.

So it's a really nice, rich way to get a, a,some sense at a glance of how your channel's doing.

You can even see at the bottom we have a,a list of the best performing articles in a given channel,which you can sort by several vectors.

And here's a chart for, for a specific article,and so this one shows shares for a given day, and you can seethat they're split up based upon share method.

So you can really get a sense if your users' sharing via Facebookor Twitter or messages or mail,and that can help you reach out to them.

And then, of course, if you have an existing analytics platform,and you want to pull the data from Apple News into it,you can download the CSVfrom the analytics tab right from News Publisher.

So we've talked about a lot of different vectors of Apple News.

Let's talk a little bitabout how you can make your content successfulin Apple News.

So there are lots of ways you can drive readersto your channel.

We're going to cover three main ones right now.

So, first, you, you want to link to your channelfrom wherever you can and drive traffic to it.

Use the promoted articles feature, which I'll show you.

And then use conical URL's, and we'll talk about whatthat is in a minute, too.

And, in addition, we have a link at the end of the presentationto our Marketing Guidelines page.

There's lots of information about how you can,can promote your channel outside of News.

So getting the word out about your channel is critical,and make it really easy to get the link to your channel,you just go into News Publisher under the channel info tab,see that there's a shared link link.

So you click on that, and it brings up a dialoguewhere you can just copy your linkand then share it with the world.

So we also have a promoted articles features,and so what this does is when you promote an article,it will ensure that every user sees that article at the topof your channel when they visit it.

And then when they come back, that article will start to movedown as you deliver more articles, but it will ensurethat everyone sees it at the top of your channel at least once.

And it also, make sure it appears in the more from sectionat the bottom of articles that you delivered.

You can promote up to three articles per section.

It's really easy to promote.

You just click on the little star next to an article,and then it moves up to the promoted articles sectionin News Publisher.

So you can always see what you have promoted at a given time.

So a great way to add some visibility to certain articles.

Alright. So, finally, conical URL's.

It's really easy to share in News.

You can just swipe and tap to share.

In iOS10, we've made it even easier.

You can, we have a share icon on every single article.

So users will be sharing a lot, and you want to make surethat users can get to your, your articles no matterwhich platform they're on.

And so conical URL's are essentially a link backto your original website.

So if you have a website, and a user shares an Apple.News link,if you included a conical URL when you delivered your article,if a user visits that link on a Mac or other non-iOS device,it will redirect them to Safari to your original web page.

So it's a great way to make surethat users can read your articles no matter what platformthey're on.

And so it falls back if you're on non-iOS.

And this is an example of an Apple.News link,and then its accompanying conical URL.

If you don't have a conical URL, users will see this screen,which isn't an ideal screen.

And so if you do have a website,you should include your conical URLso users can view it on any platform.

Alright. So some of the best practices overallfor publishing in Apple News.

Write great stuff.

Try to check for errors and typos and things like that.

If you have errors or problems with your text,it makes it harder for us to classifyand then recommend it to users.

So really make sure you're writing the best qualityyou can.

Deliver high-resolution images and use galleries.

Nothing drives engagement like great visual content.

Use Rich Text and pull quotes, animations and parallax.

Anything else that Apple News Format lets you doand be creative.

There are so many interesting cool tools you can use.

Dig around in the documentation, and see what else you can do.

We really recommend that you spend some time creating great,great articles.

And then use Apple.News when linking,but use conical URL's when you can.

And then we also recommend having a somewhat consistentpublishing cadence so users know what to expectif you're publishing on a regular basis.

They'll come back to your channelon a regular basis as well.

And so Apple News is very much an Apple app, and we love great,beautiful, and inspired stories, and we have many actual humanson the Apple News team, the editorial team who go throughand look for amazing Apple News format content.

They're looking for the best stuff to feature,and so we encourage you to be creative and ambitiouswith what you publish,and if you're doing great engaging Apple News Formatstories, our editors may notice, and they might promote youand help you find the new audiencethat you wouldn't have otherwise found.

So a few places we do this are in top stories,in our new Featured Story section in iOS 10,in the Explore tab, in the recommended widget, and for you.

We also have an Apple News Twitter account where we tweetout some of the best articlesthat have been published throughout the day,and then we have a weekly e-mail that we send out to many,many users, and it's another great venue to be discovered.

So some homework to do.

So first you want to sign up for Apple News Format,create a channel, and then start publishing articles using eitheryour CMS via the Apple News API, download and set up a plug in,or you can author in News Publisher.

So this is more information about some of the linksand other places in, in this link.

And then there's also a related session on Friday.

This is an amazing session dedicated to teaching you howto create incredible Apple News Format articles.

So I can't recommend this session highly enough.

Casey and Dan will help you make standout storiesthat really engage and delight your users.

They use some really cool stuff.

So I highly recommend checking this one out.

So thanks, and I hope you're having a great time at WWDC.

[ Applause ]

Apple, Inc.AAPL1 Infinite LoopCupertinoCA95014US

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